Yellow Roses
by Akatsuki Feathers
Summary: Friendship is certainly the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love. *Red Goth/Henrietta/Curly Goth, quick read*
1. Lilith

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0.0. _Lilith_

* * *

Once upon a midnight sun,  
_Adam and Lilith were born  
__From pollution and muck._

_From Adam came Eve,  
__A piece of his rib  
__That would forever connect them._

_Their love did blossom,  
__Eve tamed by Adam.  
__Adam tamed by Eve._

_But Lilith, with all her independence—  
__With all her pride—  
__Was cast aside...._

_She could never be  
__With Adam,  
__And a life of forever feral was given._

_The snake with green eyes was born._


	2. I Wish I Was From Another Planet

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* * *

_

1.1. I Wish I Was From Another Planet

* * *

I am an invisible man.

My name is Logan Jeremy Black the second, named after my bastard of a father, Logan Jeremy Black the first.

Right from birth, my life has been marked by a form of anonymity. Where I, not only, am not permitted to have an identity of my own, but I must live to the expectations and goals set by the man whom calls himself "Dad." Worst of all, I must forever be connected to the man who I loathe more than anything else within this bleak abyss of a world.

By that time I was born, my parents were young and together.

By the time I turned ten, they were no longer young and they were no longer together.

By this point, I am nineteen and I live with my mother... away from my father and trapped in this hick-town known infamously as South Park.

It is my senior year in high school and my only... companions... are two sixteen-year-olds and one thirteen-year-old.

I must be a cradle-robber.

The youngest one is a boy named Joshua Smith. He came into my life when he was in kindergarten and when I was in sixth grade. With blue eyes and the straightest hair I've ever seen, he stands alone in the "group" by not only by being the youngest but also being that he is not naturally dark-haired. From what I can see when he exits his silent spells, he focuses most of his energy concerning himself over gothic novels and writing his own.

The second youngest is another boy. His Communist-fearing father lovingly named him after his favorite movie, Red Dawn. He has an unshakable temper and, entering the stages of puberty at last, seems to think more with his fists and dick than with his actual brain. My tolerance for him is wearing very thin as of late, perhaps because I'm leaving my tormenting era of growing while he is just beginning it. His place within us is his enjoyment for shitty music and his border-line "Emo" ways.

The third and only female of our "group" is Henrietta Frost, a plump girl with dyed black hair and striking brown eyes. Alright, I will have to admit... she is more than just plump, probably a little too over-weight for her lacking height. But we are not like those Barbies that attend our school... dark, morbid beauty is more than skin deep. Of all of us, Henrietta is the most creative and the truest.

And then there is me. Tallest, oldest, and more experienced, I'm ugly as sin and could give two shits about it. Perhaps I should say I started the trend of this amongst us, but I am not that self-absorbed. It simply is not a choice, it is a progression of personality and anyone forced into it will never really belong and understand.

We learned this easily when Stan Marsh joined us for that short while.

But none of this information matters. Our names, our relationships, our appearance, our aspirations are of no importance to anyone... anywhere... at anytime in this shit-hole's history.

We are Goth and therefore we do not matter.

And with as must honesty as a black soul can muster, I would not want it any other way.


	3. Face To Face and Dream of Flying

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* * *

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1.2. Face To Face and Dream of Flying

* * *

I'm lying on my back in a place that isn't mine. It's a place that doesn't belong to any of us. At least, not by possession... But by black, hardened soul, this area is ours and will forever be ours. Even as we have parted way, gone off to do adult activities, and pursue our... dreams... this place will forever stay ours and to others like us.

The back of the Elementary school is a place to which we of the Goth variety may rest and live out the times of school.

The air is thin and thick at the same time. I cannot put my finger on why it is that way or how to explain it. The smoke of our cigarettes and Henrietta's antique perfume mixes strangely in the thin Colorado air. The wall behind us is marked with the smog that we create and a scorch-mark mares the corner where a group of idiots almost burned the school down so many years ago.

We have our territory marked. We have had it marked for quite a long time. Again, I doubt our mark will ever fade. The smell will stay forever. The wear marks on the asphalt where we sit and dance will never be covered. The neat cone-shaped piles of cigarette buds will fuse with the ground and continue to present us in their miniature sculpture forms.

A purple shoe crosses my peripheral view and I turn my gaze upwards, making myself fully aware of the walking boy above me. His eyes are sharp when they glance back down at me, such a dark shade of brown they almost appear black.

I watch as he steps over to his usual spot, marked by those same purple shoes to create a gentle divot into the asphalt, and takes a seat. He leans back, propped by his shoulder, and he huffs at the Camel tucked between his lips. "Where's Henrietta?" he asks, focused back on me once again.

"Class."

His eyes seem to light up with understanding and he confirms his thought with, "Is today English day?"

He is correct. I nod to him and we both settle, fully understanding that Henrietta indeed did not skip school that day.

The thing with Henrietta is that she does enjoy skipping class like the rest of us, but she will not stand missing English. Literature, as she had lectured us all in the past, is the only form of respectable entertainment anymore. And even then, she added like a footnote, books were loosing their meaning, popularity taking over like every other media in the world. That was one of the reasons why she urged Joshua to write more, to write better, and to write deeper.

"Think like Tolkien," I caught her saying once.

Damn, I hate Lord of the Rings.

But damn if I didn't respect her for sloshing through that shit.

I sigh and ask Red where Joshua is. The proximity of the three schools isn't very far from one another, and it wouldn't be difficult for him to sneak out of the middle school and come back to the elementary school. It wasn't like the quiet boy to not be there.

He shrugs and licks his ashen lips, looking to the sky with a distance, mind far from this earth. "No idea," smoke pushes past his teeth and into the air, "He was probably caught and put in in-school."

I rubbed my chin and stared at the sky as well, wondering why our group seemed as disjointed as of lately. Henrietta was busy with school, Joshua was being watched like a hawk, and Red and I are not really on good terms at the moment.

I really hate thinking this, but perhaps we're all growing up. We're all growing distant...

Huh...


	4. Find a Girl

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_1.3. __Find a Girl_

* * *

We're sitting in the diner at two in the morning once again; only awake because of the pure black coffee that now rushes through our blood. There is probably enough caffeine in a single once of us to give a small dog a heart attack.

The waitress is giving us dirty looks again and seems tired. They probably want to close...

Well too fucking bad! We're sticking here until one of us passes out. (Probably Joshua since his little body can't handle as much as ours.)

I'm sipping down straight brewed coffee, counting the chips on the lip of the table to pass the time, pondering to myself what the future could possibly hold for a person like me. Damn, the school year was ending and I was failing most of my classes. Above all else, I had nothing to do after school.

My skills, let's put it, are nonexistent. I have no amazing abilities, no amazing talents, no strong ambitions... nothing. I'm probably going to be a factory worker the rest of my lower-middle-class life.

The thought was particularly hilarious: Me, sitting in a grey and dull factory, capping toothpaste or packing away boxes of Twinkies. I'd end the day at four in the afternoon and head home to a fluttering stay-at-home wife and three fucking kids, Marcus, Logan III, and Suzy, all of them just as ugly and just as miserable as I am. Spending the rest of the afternoon trying to figure how the hell I got into such a situation and downing a couple glasses of hand-warmed scotch.

The wife, such a quick flash in my mind, is a stereotypical stay-at-home mom, dressed in a frilly black dress with a wide apron on. Smooth legs, skillful hands, and a round face with sharp brown eyes. Certainly not skinny, I found the image continuing, because none of the good women are thin nowadays.

Missus and Mister Black...

I snort into my coffee, feeling the hot drink splash briefly on my upper lip.

The four break from their silence to look at me.

"What's so funny?" Henrietta asks me with, brown eyes focused heavily against my face... probably at my nose...

I shrug coolly, acting as if none of those Barbie thoughts had been running through my caffeine influenced mind. "Nothing..."

I look at Henrietta and feel my chest clench tightly, painfully. I start to realize with quick and awful thoughts that the person I imagined to be my wife was none other than Henrietta Frost.


	5. This Elevator Only Goes Up to Ten

* * *

_2.1. __This Elevator Only Goes Up to Ten_

* * *

"GOD FUCKING DAMMIT!" Red screamed as he forced his way through his tiny bedroom. Everything his hands made contact was instantly broken up in bit and pieces. "YOU FUCKING PIECE OF SHIT!"

"Oh calm down Red!" Old father Dawn yelled at him, banging his fists against the locked door, "I'm really getting sick of this screaming."

He turned venomous brown eyes to the door, "YOU KNOW SHIT, DAD. JUST GO THE FUCK AWAY!" He clenched his nightstand dangerously hard and threw it to the door, sending the piece of oak furniture into a crash of scattered pieces and open drawers.

The inner belongings of those drawers spilled across the floor, flooding it with past memories that he didn't have time in the past to throw away. Marbles from his childhood years, photos upon photos, all varying in age, a spoon and an array of coins.

After one final scream, Red sank to the floor and he shifted through the pictures that lay scattered across the brown carpet of his bedroom floor. All of them were like the others, different people and different times but with similar lights and similar angles.

One with Red smiling innocently with a girl, hair fashioned into a high brown pony-tail. They're both dressed in light colors. Him in browns; her in powder pinks. The two are about four or so years old.

Another one, Red older and darker, hair not yet dyed red by the roots. In the picture, there is another girl, plumper then the one from before but with the same brown eyes and thin mouth. Her hair is wild and black, chopped short with hazard snips, and her smile is much more vicious then the girl from before.

Years later, a group picture: Red, standing in the middle, shoulders hunched and face distant. He loathes the camera, his eyes spoke to the lens right before the picture was taken. His hair was longer in the more recent photo, hanging in his face and with the dye burning through his scalp. Beside him stood the girl from so long ago, hair black and eyes even sharper. Her body is much plumper then the years before, social life never too kind to her. In the very front, a small boy with dark eyes and blue eyes stared at the camera as if it were sucking away his soul. They're wide, his eyes, and they stare straight into the lens, his body shifting into flight-mode. Finally, in the very back of the group, a tall boy glowered over them, his shoulders hunched and his back curved slightly. His narrow and long face stares at the camera with a deep-seeded loathing, long nose pointed down like the hungry beak of a vulture. On the back of the photo, written in shaking letters, are lyrics to a song Red had long forgotten:

_Need more friends with wings,  
All the angels I know put concrete in my veins  
I'd always walk home alone,  
So I became lifeless just like my telephone_

_There's nothing to lose  
When no one knows your name  
There's nothing to gain  
But the days don't seem to change_

_Never played truth or dare,  
I'd have to check my mirror to see if I'm still here  
My parents had no clue,  
That I ate all my lunches alone in the bathroom_

_There's nothing to lose  
When no one knows your name  
There's nothing to gain  
But the days don't seem to change_

_There's nothing to lose  
My notebook will explain  
There's nothing to gain  
And I can't fight the pain_

_Teacher said it's just a phase,  
When I grow up, my children will probably do the same  
Kids just love to tease,  
Who'd know it'd put me underground at 17_

_There's nothing to lose  
When no one knows your name  
There's nothing to gain  
But the days don't seem to change_

_There's nothing to lose  
My notebook will explain  
There's nothing to gain  
And I just died today_

A dangerous feeling filled his lungs and he set the picture down, away from sight for a hopeful three more years.

His breath shivered from his body and he felt all anger from before drain and dispair slowly take its place. His eyes slowly fell to his legs and he tried to think away the painful memories of past mistakes.


	6. It’s Four O’Clock in the Fucking Morning

* * *

_2.2. __It's Four O'Clock in the Fucking Morning_

* * *

"_His backpack is all he knows,_" Red whispered as he walked to the Elementary school, his hands stuffed within his pockets and his heart beating nearly out of his chest. He nervously licked his lips, eyes shifting from cement block to cement block as he progressed down the side-walk. "_Shot down by strangers..!_" He hummed the rest of the lyric, tone hovering higher then the actual one.

The wind slammed into his side and he hugged his arms closer to his body, hunching over and forcing his eyes angrily to the group.

He HATED South Park and the cold that surrounded it on a constant basis. His insides froze as the weather dropped faster and faster and the mornings became difficult to unthaw from every day. He was a child of the city, of New York or California. At least in New York there were hot summers to balance out the ungodly cold.

Red felt his mind filter like coffee grinds and water back to the past and back to the coffee that sat in his bag. It was begging for the caress of his lips against it, begging for him to slurp away the hot innards. His coffee was masochistic. Always had been, always will be; even after Red's stomach turned against him from old age and refused to ingest anything other then prunes and grapefruit properly.

"_...while holding his breath half to death!_" he whisper-screamed, breath turning to fog in the air.

Suicide hung in the air and he walked by it, lungs filtering the familiar smog from his lungs and back out into the thin air. He took no glance behind him and at the street behind him; there would be nothing to see either way. All there would be was his mind and the flurries of snow that danced across the pavement of the road.

The photos scattered across his vision as the school entered it, leaving his breathless and on verge of a panic attack.

It had been years since his body had such a conspiracy against him.

"_Crawls like a worm—!_" the microphones strapped over his head blared into the silent winter air.

"_Crawls like a worm—!_"

As the air settled the further lyrics screamed through, leaving his mind to a white-washed land and his thoughts of dangerous things.

"_Crawls like a worm from a bird! Crawls like a worm... Crawls like a worm from a bird!_"

"I need to talk to Henrietta," he muttered, brown eyes squinted against the over-cast sky. He knew these feelings like an intimate partner. He could scope her body with the lights out and his eyes closed, knowing where every little detail was and where the small sweat spots rested.

Self-loathing was his playground and panic was the back of his hand.

The song had long switched as he lingered towards the behind of the old school, his purple shoes forcing his frozen body forward.

"_...not enough to feed the hungry._"

Fuck the cold air of South Park.


	7. Lonely Heart Never Had Nobody

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_2.3. __Lonely Heart Never Had Nobody_

* * *

It was just the two of them: Red and Henrietta, Henrietta and Red. In his father's old bomb shelter. Alone.

Just Red and Henrietta. Just Henrietta and Red.

She lounged on the mattress that had been there since the beginning of the Red Scare. It had been covered with bed-slips, sheets, covers and comforters, pillows and more pillows. These hadn't been in the shelter since the beginning of the Red Scare. No, they had been there only as long as Red had figured out the coding system for the door.

He had found it carved in the rubber bottom of his father's old hunting boots. Right foot, all the way across...

Henrietta had brought them there from her ever growing collection of gothic bedding, willing to spare them for a hide-out such as the bomb-shelter.

It had been quite a while since any of them had been to the bomb-shelter. Always too busy, always so mixed... it had been months since all four of them had been down there in the dim yellow lights of the back-up generator, allowed to wallow in their misery without the outside world to interfere with them. You could just... disappear... when within the bomb-shelter.

Red had thought about it many times; he had done it many times as well, never fully going through with it.

The dehydrated food was bad and the water soon stale.

...beggars can't be choosers.

Books of dark and gothic literature, complied by all of them, were stacked within each corner: The Castle of Otranto, Dracula, the Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Rosemary's Baby, and many more like them. Stephen King had his own corner, piled high with as many books that Henrietta could get her hands on... Dean Koontz was burned.

Red never bothered to actually read any of them. They were more of Henrietta's and Joshua's gig. Rather, he spent his time plucking away at his bass guitar, thumping out a simple base-line to which his feet loved to step to.

"Red," she started, leaving him to lick his dry lips and wander of to the shelf covered in half-eaten rations, bottles of water, a digital clock, a music player plucking out Serj Tankien and an assortment of other useless junk. His fingers danced over the dust-covered shelf as she continued on, "What's troubling you?"

He glanced at her from the corner of his eye and he slowly pulled the photos from his back pocket. He stepped over slowly, nervous beyond measure, and he gave them to her. With his breath held in too tight, he went back to the shelf in hopes of distraction.

The dust didn't perform on Wednesdays. No refunds.

"What the..?" She focused at the most up to date one the group had. With a quick flip of her wrist, she looked at the back, eyes flickering as she read. "What year was this?"

"Three," he answered stiffly, panic seizing at his spin.

"Before, during or—"

"During," his tongue sopped his ashen lips.

"Are you feeling it..?" Her tone was hesitant and curious, concerned and distant, worrisome and soft.

He swallowed down the breath that he had been holding since the start and he slowly nodded.

She stood up carefully, pictures all but discarded against the bed. She stepped over to him, small feet making small taps against the floor. "Red, let me see,"

He nodded and rolled his sleeves up, revealing a group of disarranged scars, all small and white and thin. None of them were new but the flesh was pink from his scratching and picking.

"Roll up your pants," she ordered, voice quickly rolling with a motherly sort of confidence.

He rolled his pants up the best he could due to their close proximity to his thin but wiry claves, revealing white paste skin. Old scars streaked them too, but nothing new.

"You didn't do anything, did you?"

He shook his head, still muted by some form of pride that his body still held. If he spoke a word, he would probably break-down again, like the night before.

And she stood frozen for a long time, face and eyes unreadable in his shamed-state.

Dangerous things bubbled in his chest and before he knew it, Henrietta had wrapped her warm arms around him and had pulled him into an even warmer embrace.

Water dripped from the ceiling and down his cheek, sliding a drop down it and over his trembling lips.

"I'm really proud of you, Red." She muttered and kissed his cheek.

The roof was leak-proof.


	8. Love’s a Funeral of Hearts

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_3.1. __Love's a Funeral of Hearts_

* * *

"Friendship is certainly the finest balm  
for the pangs of disappointed love."  
A cunning young woman,  
with hair like curled bronze,  
and baby-doll cheeks once said.  
To me, I think not,  
I am but a boy,  
she but a legend,  
a novelist,  
a myth.  
One day, I only to hope,  
I only pray  
—_Calliope—  
_that I could bring forth beauty  
that Jane Austin once made.

In the bitter South Park air,  
Joshua walked side-by-side  
with a murder of teenagers.  
The snow covered  
snow-shaded cement  
buckled under their feet  
as they stepped by.  
Deep within their minds,  
emotions stirred between the three  
other ravens,  
leaving small Joshua  
all alone.  
So alone.

Henrietta kept her arms  
entwined around Red's body,  
encasing him with a hug  
that could never,  
ever,  
ever,  
be allowed within  
the Gothic culture.

Logan's face was  
solid as stone...  
distant,  
trapped away in a world  
that only his hatred could unlock.

Joshua's mind clicked,  
his big blue eyes focused  
upon the three of them,  
and his mind concluded...  
something.

He was the one who was  
mature.  
He was the one who was  
unaffected.  
He was the one who was  
the animal within Eden  
as the three humans  
tried to live in peace.

Adam kept his arm  
tight around Eve,  
protecting her from  
the world,  
the dangers,  
herself.

Eve allowed Adam to hold her,  
perhaps glad for comfort  
and safety,  
security and  
love.

Lilith was stone,  
walking by without a care,  
inner workings stirring,  
anger brewing,  
eyes turning green,  
all focused on Adam.

Angels cried blood over their children.

Logan turned his green gaze,  
dark and murky,  
to the two comforting teens.  
His teeth exposed,  
and his emotions swelled,  
visible on his vulture-face.

Joshua turned his sky gaze  
and concern bubbled in his gut.

"Hey,"  
a boy across the road,  
screamed like the galls of hyenas,  
"Wolverines!"  
His cry continued, but  
Red's head snapped up,  
at the mention of such a  
disgusting,  
vile,  
terrible,  
creature of the underworld.

His face filled with rage,  
roots and cheeks and name a match,  
and he jerked out of  
helpful Henrietta's arms.  
"What was that?"  
He screamed at the  
boy who laughed.

"I'm so sick of that joke..."  
Henrietta muttered as  
Red ran over to the jokester.

Logan seemed to calm,  
body relaxing with the  
absence of a certain Goth.  
He slid, quiet,  
ghostly,  
to Henrietta's side,  
possessive in a way  
that only Joshua could see.

Only Joshua could see truth,  
only he could see the truth of  
Logan's moves,  
Henrietta's arms,  
Red's anger...  
Only he, youngest,  
wet-behind-the-ears  
Joshua could see the true  
troubles that  
the group of gothic teenagers  
were facing with...

Love

A vile, unwanted feeling  
amongst the pack  
in the very least.

Love

A terrible curse,  
subjected to feelings,  
happiness,  
and a 43 percent divorce rate.

_Just like a soap_,  
the littlest Goth pondered.

But in reality,  
such a fickle thing,  
he was concerned  
and hurt.  
It pained him to see  
such turmoil amongst  
friends,  
family,  
and he didn't want them to feel  
the pain of love.

Nor did he want  
them to hurt  
one another.

Red had punched the  
boy who laughed,  
and his fist was covered,  
oh-so-covered,  
in rich,  
thick,  
wine.

Logan spoke to Henrietta,  
his face contorted and  
very, very serious.

Her face twisted with  
his own,  
her eyes accusing,  
startled,  
and lips pinched in  
what Joshua figured as  
confusion.

"What?"  
She asked, voice higher  
then the sweet syrup voice  
that only Siouxsie Sioux  
held.

"I love you."

And Pandora's Box  
released its troubles  
onto the world.


	9. Mesmerize the Simple Minded

* * *

_3.2. __Mesmerize the Simple Minded_

* * *

"To fear love is to fear life,  
and those who fear life  
are already three parts dead."  
I'm already dead,  
Melpomene laughs.

The bomb-shelter,  
cold and dreary,  
six feet under,  
was their grave.

Logan was gone.  
He left long ago,  
no longer able to stand the  
pressures of the other ravens.

Henrietta never stirred,  
eyes glued to page 228  
of _House of Leaves  
_stuck upon the single word...  
"vanishing"

Red plunked away  
at the base,  
feet not moving  
with their usual beat.

All hearts are broken,  
that much is true.

Joshua's heart tore,  
his mouth filled with glue,  
and his fingers tapping  
twelve,  
fifteen,  
twenty-two  
five...

"What are we to do?"  
He asked them, face unmoving,  
eyes unmoving,  
lips unmoving.

His mind was working,  
mile a minute,  
earth in the span of seconds.

Henrietta stood  
left.

The book rested open,  
stuck upon page 228.

"vanishing"


	10. I’ll Carry the World on My Shoulders

* * *

_3.3. __I'll Carry the World on My Shoulders_

* * *

"Just because you love someone  
doesn't mean you have to be  
involved with them.  
Love is not a bandage to cover wounds."  
It shouldn't be true,  
I know that.  
But someone has to  
give up  
on the one...  
on the one they...  
love.  
Please help us, Thalia...

"Henrietta..."  
He asked, hands clasped  
down near his feet.

"Yes?"  
Her voice was distant  
but her attention  
stuck to him.

They were alone  
behind the school,  
sitting and trying...  
trying...  
to read through  
good literature.

Both minds weren't  
truly  
there.

"Do you  
love  
him?"

The thin air  
grew thinner  
thinner,  
thinner,  
until the world was  
space.

"Yes,"

Joshua bit his lips,  
sealing them.

He didn't ask which  
—Logan or Red—  
she truly liked.


	11. 222 Days of Light

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* * *

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4.1. 222 Days of Light

* * *

My bedroom is my only sanctuary. It is where I can rest in the blankets and kisses of night, where everything in the universe makes sense, and where everything in the world is right.

My bedroom is no long my sanctuary. It has abandoned me for a mistress all too kinder and all too shallow.

As I shut my eyes, the sound of tides and whispers enter my ears and nothing makes sense any more. All understanding of the universe left with my sanctuary, everything stolen by the mistress known as love.

Love has visited me; love has forced my life upside-down and inside-out.

Everything is wrong, nothing is right; perhaps William Golding is sneering in his grave, who really knows anymore.

In the span of a week, perhaps a bit longer, both of my closest male friends announced to me that they hold very un-gothic feelings towards me.

I should have seen it. Those two... there were tensions between them for years now. Ever since we entered high school, ever since Red's attempts at suicide, all of those things; the tensions between them only seemed to grow and now we were at the vertex of this trouble... now it all centered on me...

Joshua had asked me which one I had loved.

What a difficult question to answer. I love all of them to some extent. They're family to me; I've known all of them for most of my life.

In fact, I've known Red almost my entire life. Our parents were friends and we used to have play-dates. We've been friends longer then we've been Goths.

It speaks novels.

Then there's Logan. He was old enough to legally have sex and just at the appendix of his senior year.

And me, sixteen and at the end of my sophomore year...

I've never been a big fan of relationships with a significant age differences.


	12. How I Hear the Nature Cry

* * *

_4.2. __How I Hear the Nature Cry_

* * *

"Red, what did you do?" I asked Red as I stared at his face.

He smiled weakly at me, lips red and agitated. Under his lip was a small, silver stud. It suddenly wiggled and I assumed he was the one who made it do that. "Pierced my lip," he replied.

I stared at him for a long moment, blinking softly.

His round face beamed with a sort of light that I haven't seen in a long time. He seemed happy.

Perhaps I should have been dreadful of this optimism, but my concern over his mental well-being easily overrode my gothic mentality.

It was good to see him happy. He had been so depressed for such a long time, a sort of stoicism would have been good to see. So it was wonderful that he was truly, visibly happy.

I half-smiled at him, "Why?"

His face faltered a little, "Do you not like it?"

I rolled my eyes at him and placed my hands onto my hips, "Don't worry Red, I do like it."

He looked down and smiled, cheeks a little red.

In the back of my mind, I mused over how quaint he looked, blushing.

"Do you like me?"

I was frozen in place, feet forced into the sidewalk. "Please, Red..."

"Do you?" He lifted his head to look at me with soulful eyes.

I rolled my lips together, staring at him long and hard. "Give me some time, Red. Please?"

The light in his face dimmed but he nodded. "Yeah, okay."

Thank you.


	13. Hello, I’m Still Here

* * *

_4.3. Hello, I'm Still Here_

* * *

Inside my heart, there were inky storm clouds or torment.

How in the frozen hell did I get into such a complicated and hurtful situation?

I did like Red in that sort of way, even if it was just a little. But Logan...Logan was a mature man; he knew things to a stronger degree than any of us. He knew things and he understood things and he only got involved with things when he was totally serious.

I was trapped within a paradox of following true feelings or entering a relationship that would, no doubt about it, have real substance.

Along with that, I did not want to hurt either of them. It was a lose-lose situation, really, being that if I chose no one, I would hurt them both... but if I did choose someone, the other would be hurt even that much more.

The bedroom that was no longer my sanctuary encased my wondering soul, leaving a wide enough space for me to think things through.

It would be difficult, but I had to do something.

And something was what I was going do...


	14. Logan

* * *

_0.0. __Logan_

* * *

_Once upon a time  
__There was a boy  
__and a girl_

_Years before the boy  
__and girl were born  
__a boy called Logan lived._

_Logan loved the girl.  
__The boy loved her too.  
__There was conflict._

_Logan's green eyes  
__clearly showed his  
__overwhelming envy._

_The girl,  
__faced with a decision  
and __chose the boy._

_The snake with green eyes left._

* * *

**The End.**

* * *

Inspiration:

Logan's Chapters: Wanted to test out present tense.  
Bands: Alien Sex Fiend, Siouxsie & the Banshees, the Cure

Red's Chapters: Wanted to use music lyrics. Some influence of Richard Brautigan's sort of jumped in there, since I'm reading Trout Fishing in America.  
Bands: My Chemical Romance, the Used, Billy Talent

Joshua's Chapters: Always wanted to write an epic poem... I'm not very good at poetry. Sorry.  
Bands: HIM, System of a Down, the Rasmus

Henrietta's Chapters: Write more first-person POV.  
Bands: Nightwish, Arcana, Evanescence


End file.
